


Let Your Curse Be On Me

by CorpseBrigadier



Category: Final Fantasy Tactics
Genre: Angst, Childhood Memories, Death in Childbirth, Gen, Illnesses, Injury, Interactive Fiction, Miscarriage, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2020-11-22 09:24:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20871923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CorpseBrigadier/pseuds/CorpseBrigadier
Summary: An interactive story about two brothers caught in enemy territory during a prolonged war. (Does not require any canon knowledge to play, although a brief canon primer is included.)





	1. Link to Game

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Reishiin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Reishiin/gifts).

> This game was developed as an interactive fanfiction featuring two non-major characters from Square-Enix's 1998 _Final Fantasy Tactics_; however, it has been written to be played by an audience unfamiliar with that game. It features an imagined pre-canon episode that requires no knowledge of events in FFT's plot, and proper nouns have been effaced with the exception of most names for places and organizations.
> 
> Chapter 2 of this work contains a brief canon primer which is largely specific to the two characters and their respective narrative arcs. Chapter 3 contains the proofing copy of the game code and is not very good reading.
> 
> * * *
> 
> **Note on Content:** If you would like to play through this story and avoid specific types of narrative content, there are some actions you may take to do so. Some level of violence, injury, and death will occur in all playthroughs of the work, although there is no player death in this work. If you wish to avoid mentions of pregnancy, miscarriage, and death in childbirth, you may do so by avoiding the command _**Endure**_ with the brother represented by the leftmost column of text. If you wish to avoid mentions of prolonged illness, you may do so by avoiding the command _**Intervene**_ with the brother represented by the rightmost column of text. It is not possible to avoid all mentions of both.
> 
> **Note on Mechanics:** This work contains a few features that are timed. They were designed around the creator's average reading speed, and your experience with these elements may differ if you read significantly faster or significantly slower. If you are a fast reader and wish to explore all narrative options within the game, it may be to your benefit to take some time to think when you encounter a screen where you feel like there should be more options than the ones presented to you.
> 
> **Note on Mobile Devices:** This work was not optimized for mobile devices, yet I've managed to play it on my android anyway with no difficulties. Your experience may vary.

Play the game [here](https://corpsebrigadier.itch.io/let-your-curse-be-on-me).

Note: If the game link is still password protected at the time of reveals, the password is: LYCBOM

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was really inspired by your enthusiasm for IF in your requests, and it convinced me to give a try to a lot of things I'd been considering both for this canon and for IF in general. I hope you enjoy what I came up with.


	2. Canon Primer

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While this work was designed to be accessible to people not familiar with the canon, below is a basic outline of the applicable major events of _Final Fantasy Tactics_' narrative setting and an extended description of the two characters you play as within "Let Your Curse Be On Me."
> 
> **Note on Names:** I'm pretty committed at this point to just using whatever names I think sound best between the PSP and PSX translations of the game. I follow PSX orthography 80-90% of the time, but I tend to use more PSP terms for Fifty Years War proper nouns, as they are most easily Googlable for reference via these spellings. Given that I got rid of a lot of proper nouns in "Let Your Curse Be On Me" this shouldn't be too much of an issue.

**The Original Final Fantasy Tactics and the Fifty Years War **

The actual plot of _Final Fantasy Tactics_ is centered around a young bastard nobleman named Ramza Beoulve, who is mentioned in "Let Your Curse Be On Me" only in passing and only during one narrative branch. The game is set in the medievalesque high fantasy kingdom of Ivalice, and its story depicts the interventions of Ramza and his childhood friend Delita in a developing civil war known as the War of the Lions, which is loosely based on the English War of the Roses.

"Let Your Curse Be On Me" presents an episode from the conflict preceding the War of the Lions, known as the Fifty Years War--the real world analogue of which is very clearly the French/English Hundred Years War. The history of this earlier war is mentioned in _FFT_ only via in-game tavern rumors and in character dossiers, but it is a clear and omnipresent influence on the societal troubles that drive the War of the Lions throughout its narrative.

The war began when Ivalice's King Denamda II declared himself the rightful ruler of its eastern neighbor Ordallia following the death of the Ordallian king Devanne III, claiming that as Devanne's uncle, he had the right of succession over Devanne's nephew Varoi VI. He subsequently marched on Ordallia when his claim to the throne was rejected, although the issue of succession appears to have largely been a pretext for attempting to intervene with regards to Zelmonia, a formerly independent state that had been annexed to Ordallia nearly a century prior. Following the death of Denamda II during the Ivalician march towards the Ordallian capital of Viura, the conflict fell into a prolonged stalemate, during which the country of Romanda attacked Ivalice's western shore. Romanda had been petitioned by the Ordallians to intervene, but it eventually withdrew from the conflict three years later during an outbreak of plague.

Denamda II's successor, Denamda IV, distinguished himself as a military leader during his brief reign. However, he died suddenly following the end of the Romandan phase of the war and was replaced by his sickly and weak-minded son Omdolia III, who is still king at the opening of the events of _Final Fantasy Tactics_. Without a competent monarch to lead them, the Ivalicians are eventually drawn into negotiating a peace by Varoi VI's successor Prince Lennario. This peace, however, involves the payment of heavy war reparations to Ordallia, leaving Ivalice's economy gutted and numerous soldiers without pay. This sets the stage for widespread social unrest, which is a major component in the events precipitating the War of the Lions.

**Dycedarg and Zalbag Beoulve**

The two characters you control in "Let Your Curse Be On Me" are Ramza Beoulve's older brothers, Dycedarg and Zalbag Beoulve, who both distinguished themselves in the course of the Fifty Years War. They are the two legitimate sons of Balbanes Beoulve, a knight in the service Duke Larg of Gallione who leads the order known as the Hokuten (or the Knights of the Northern Sky). Balbanes' younger children, Ramza and Alma, are of commoner blood via an unknown woman with the surname "Lugria," but they appear to have been legitimized and live with the rest of their family at Igros during the initial events of _Final Fantasy Tactics_.

**_Dycedarg (left-hand text)_ **is 37 at the beginning of _Final Fantasy Tactics _and roughly 32 in "Let Your Curse Be on Me." He is noteworthy towards the end of the Fifty Years War as being involved in his father's negotiation of an Ordallian peace, although he is also a formidable fighter. Over the course of _Final Fantasy Tactics_, it is revealed that he has been manipulating the succession conflict that becomes the War of the Lions, seeking to oust the royal family and position the Beoulves as rulers. In the interests of accomplishing this, he orchestrates multiple kidnappings, assassinates Duke Larg, and is eventually revealed to have poisoned his father in order to position himself as the patriarch of his family. His brother Zalbag, upon discovering this, confronts him, and the two of them are drawn into a battle that terminates in both of their deaths, with Dycedarg being transformed via a magical artifact he had been gifted into the demon Adrammelech upon his initial demise and then being killed a second time by Ramza.

**_Zalbag (right-hand text)_ **is 28 at the beginning of _Final Fantasy Tactics _and roughly 23 in "Let Your Curse Be on Me." He distinguished himself during the Fifty Years War as a hero and eventually came to direct the Hokuten/Northern Sky following his father's death. Denamda IV famously acknowledges him by stating "The savior of Ivalice is in Gallionne, and his name is Beoulve." He is also mentioned repeatedly as being a devout follower of the teachings of the Glabados Church. Within _Final Fantasy Tactics_, he initially appears to be wholly in accord with Dycedarg and figures as a seemingly ruthless and amoral character early in the game, during which he authorizes the shooting of Tietra Hyral (a peasant girl raised alongside the younger members of his family) while she is being held hostage by revolutionary terrorists. He also later rebukes Ramza over claims regarding Dycedarg's schemes, denouncing him for his commoner blood and refusing to aid him. It is only when he witnesses Dycedarg's murder of their liege lord and subsequently uncovers evidence of their father's poisoning that he turns on his older brother, and following Dycedarg's death, he is incinerated in the course of his brother's transformation into Adrammelech. He later makes an additional appearance as a revenant, brought back to life by corrupt members of the Glabados Church to harry Ramza. During this final encounter, he begs Ramza to kill him, being in continuous pain and having no control over his actions. He thanks Ramza when he is ultimately laid to rest.


	3. Proofing Copy of Game Code

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a copy of the game code for "Let Your Curse Be On Me." It has been posted to provide a correct word count and to allow people to Ctrl-F their way through content should they so like.

# Let Your Curse Be On Me

<<set $dycedarg to "0">><<set $zalbag to "0">>We rode east by southeast, down along the steppes that separate Viura from the sea. It was strange to think that this is the first time we have both been a part of the same mission. Father had said that he needed both a diplomat and a soldier he could count on. Rumors had carried, like wind on the grass, that Varoi was eager for peace--that he would need but a few concessions with regards to the new Zelmonian border in order for the long war to be at an end. We set out in the midst of the truce, riding to where an advocate was set to draw new maps with us and talk of what agreements and remunerations might appease all involved. Of course there were suspicions! Of course we were cautious! It did not take a great strategist to fathom that there was danger in sending two sons of the Northern Sky's most revered general into the heart of enemy territory. There were plans, we had been told. Every eventuality had been considered, and there were plans. It must not be thought, then, that we did not expect the ambush. It must merely be understood that we did not expect the upset to be so sudden and so calamitous... <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Keep Riding|The Ambush]]<</timed>></span></div> <table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I recall it in a blur. The sunburnt plain seems to stretch forever, and I cannot conceive of anyone hiding in a place so open and bright--not until they're upon us.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I recall it perfectly. An early moon--waxing gibbous--stares down from a pale blue sky. The chatter of birdsong has died, and the moment I recognize this is the moment I hear the faint, choking gasp of the squire walking alongside me as the first arrow strikes home.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I draw my sword, confused.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I draw my sword, alert.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 7s t8n>>[[Run]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Fight]]<</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> </table>Our mounts screech as we try to weave back through our own troops. The sudden press of soldiers glitter in the gold of late afternoon, their serpentine armor catching the light. Everywhere there is chaos. Everywhere there is the moan of men dying. What stratagem or sorcery they used to appear so suddenly and swarm so thick, we do not know, but the air seems a cloud of arrows. It can only be by some miracle of fate that neither of us are stuck as the beasts beneath us go down, their wide black eyes clouding as we scramble and try to run on foot. We are in the heart of their land, however. We must know as we run past through the plain, that we will not run forever. When we are caught, pinned all around by sword points, it becomes clear their goal was always to take the two of us alive. <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Surrender]]<</timed>></span></div> We charge them head on, swords flashing in the gold light of a not yet dying day. Some of our men follow; some flee. Many of them die before we reach their line, falling to a wall of archers whose black bows curve back like rams' horns. By some miracle of the Saint, we make it to the wall of troops unscathed and watch as it breaks, soldiers scattering in our wake. We cut down a few dozen of them before we realize we are fighting alone, the rest of our company having fallen. The heat of the battle is punctuated by moans as they finish off the dying and injured, the scent of that bloody excrement that comes with every battlefield taking to the hot air. It is only when our mounts are cut from underneath us that we realize we were always meant to survive this. Those nearest press thick around us, swords pointed towards our throats. <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Surrender]]<</timed>></span></div>We march through that night, wrists bound and eyes shrouded as they take us to some place we know not. The silence with which they move us is terrible, and we can discern nothing about their intentions for us once we reach our destination. We do not talk, but we are near to each other. We feel somehow across the distance and the dark the presence of our two breathing bodies in proximity. We can make out the dimming light of dawn through our blindfolds, and the ground beneath our feet turns to roots and leaves and then to stone. We stop, and somebody takes charge of us, eventually uncovering our eyes. It is an old Yudoran ruin, the weathered remains of some fortress or temple, its walls worn down jutting teeth in the midst of the trees. They have made a camp here, and we see the dimming coals of fires recently put out. The Ordallians are scattered about haphazardly--poor ragged infantry with patched armor and thin faces. They usher us down some stairs and into a low-roofed chamber in the heart of this wreck of a building. <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Follow]]<</timed>></span></div><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">We are flung onto the floor where four men stand ready, and I know almost immediately that it's me they want. I am the diplomat; I know what we are willing to offer; I should know what recourse we would have should negotiations fail. I am also the one who speaks Ordallian.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">They push us to the ground and I see four men ready. I close my eyes and try to pray, for all I know that this ordeal will not pass from us lightly. When I open them, I look to my brother and he meets my gaze for a fraction of a second, but I cannot fathom the meaning of his look.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I don't speak it to them, however. Not at first. I have nothing to tell them that they can use, and the longer I prolong that illusion, the longer I suspect I will live.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I think to ask what will happen to us, but I do not speak Ordallian. My brother remains silent, and I suspect he wants me to do the same. I watch as one of them approaches him.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"Where have your father's troops been ferreted away?"</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"<span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">Where have your father's troops been ferreted away?</span>"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I don't know. I don't let them know I don't know. One of them kicks me in the gut and I try not to retch as the nausea hits me.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">One of them kicks him in the stomach and I try not to react. He doesn't know how to take a hit, not reflexively--he doesn't tense. I watch as he doubles over in pain.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"What were the plans should we fail to surrender Zelmonia? Were you going to push for the capital again?"</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"<span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">What were the plans should we fail to surrender Zelmonia? Were you going to push for the capital again?</span>"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I suspect we probably are. I look at them defiantly, knowing I'll be hurt. Another one of them kicks me in the ribs, but I don't feel anything crack. I hope that they do the smart thing and try to apply a gentler method soon. I suspect that won't.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">They aim higher this time. I want to do something, but we're outnumbered and lost in the heart of their territory. I try to accept that we will die here--to start with that resignation and move forward without the perversity of hope. I want to do something. I think of Gallione, and I remember how everything was dying and laced with hoarfrost when last I saw it.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"We can do this all day, you know?"</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"<span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">We can do this all day, you know?</span>"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I know they can. I hope I can too. I look to my brother and wonder at his grim serenity in the midst of all of this. He seems to regard me as though I were nothing more than a statue--one of the martyrs that ornament the vast Lesalian cathedral where last he begged for absolution.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I wish I could understand them. I wish I could make myself understood. I look to my brother again, and he is staring at me with an intensity that feels like an accusation. I scan the room and look for every conceivable point of advantage, my eyes tracing the mossed over symbols of some heathen civilization worn down to dust.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I wonder if they will kill him. He's probably useless here.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">There is no escape that presents itself. I do not know if we will leave this place.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Keep Taking It]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 45s t8n>>[[Intervene]]<</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 55s t8n>>[[Say Something]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">They keep kicking me, and I feel the jolt of something breaking. It hurts to breathe. It hurts to move. As I taste he blood on my lips, I tell myself that all this is is pain, and whatever the terrible end to which we're moving, it will pass.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">They keep kicking him, and I hear something crack. He does not speak. He does not ask me to help him. He's clearly trying to avoid crying out as his lips curl back and he breathes heavy. I wish I knew what they intended for me--whether there was some point to making me watch this or if I am irrelevant to these proceedings.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">If they were smart, they'd do something else. I morbidly think of how I'd run this interrogation--taking the smallest sliver of satisfaction at the knowledge <em>I'd</em> know what I was doing. <em>I</em> wouldn't bludgeon the man I was questioning into incapacity or death. If you have to resort to this sort of thing you need a light touch: to find out the weakest point upon which to apply pressure in anticipation of collapse.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">My throat hurts as I try to find words to speak, but there is nothing that can be said. I think to which of the four soldiers looks weakest--most inattentive. My limbs tense as I try to think through what each motion would feel like were I to charge him, and I wrench my sweat slick wrists against the knotted cords that tie them.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"Are you Glabadosian dogs all so eager to die?"</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"<span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">Are you Glabadosian dogs all so eager to die?</span>"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I look again to my brother, who kneels, still frozen. I know where I'd apply pressure if I were them... and I wonder, as one of them knocks me in the face, when and if they'll come to the same conclusion. I wonder whether I dread or desire that they should hurt him instead of me.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I tell myself again, as I have told myself many times now and before, that death is the state to which all things move, and I think to the Saint who inexorably leads us into that Kingdom. I fear to waste my efforts, nevertheless, on impossibilities.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Endure]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 30s t8n>>[[Intervene]]<</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">There's a shout from one of the soldiers nearest the door, and everyone around me freezes. I raise my head to see my brother has just flung himself into one of the armed Ordallians surrounding us. He's fumbling about as best he can with bound hands, evidently hoping to struggle his way to the man's fallen sword.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I brace myself and try to shake off any thoughts that might slow me. I need a weapon, and the man by the door seems most off his guard, his fingers idly fidgeting with the grip of his sword. There isn't time to fully think through a plan. There isn't time to do anything but move.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">He manages to kick the guard to the ground just as my interrogators begin to rush over. The shouts around me merge into an indistinguishable blur, and I have a moment of irrational, elated hope that he'll reach the weapon. Never mind that we're hopelessly outnumbered in the heart of an enemy encampment in the heart of an enemy country; I want nothing more in the moment than for him to get his hands on that damn sword.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">So I move, and he and the sword fall. My shoulder is braced against his throat. Men are shouting. <span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">Stop him! Get that bastard before he makes a wreck of things!</span> I swoop and I kick and he falls, and suddenly I tumble free. All things operate with such thoughtless precision that I don't recognize the futility of what I do.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">His wrists are suddenly free, and I swear I see his fingers brush the pommel before one of them kicks it away. He tries to dive after it, but they catch him. For all he fights and foams, for all I know he could kill any of them in plain combat, they catch him.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I pull my hand free of the cords that bind it, watching it float before me and towards the sword. My dislocated fingers and the ring of blood around my wrist don't register. I think I can feel myself grasping and swinging the blade before it is gone. I dive, stumble... cry out in shock as the breath is knocked from my lungs.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I bury my face in the dust of the floor as I hear a shout from him abruptly stop short.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">The pain starts to melt into my body as they hold me down, and I am aware of every blow when they expend their fury on me.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Dream|Zalbag Dream 1]]<</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"They're three leagues northeast of Zarghidas, somewhere in the mountains."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"<span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">They're three leagues northeast of Zarghidas, somewhere in the mountains.</span>"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">It's a lie. Even if in my ignorance I have named the exact location of my father's army, it would not change the lie and how inelegantly transparent it is. I curse myself as one of them grabs me by the throat.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">His voice is resigned. I worry about what has been spoken, but I will not countenance the idea that he has betrayed us. He looks ashamed nevertheless, as though whatever has been said is a failing on his part--perhaps an admission.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"I don't believe you."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"<span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">I don't believe you.</span>"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Lying needs to come from a place of conviction, and in this hell, I find myself without any. A smart man's lies are nine tenths truth; he comes to believe them perfectly for the exact span they are on his own tongue.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">They grab him by the throat and throw him against the wall, and I look away. It feels cowardly, even though I cannot imagine he wants my eyes on him. Even if this is the end of all things, however, even if we disappear here, I feel I have an obligation to bear witness.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">He throws me into the wall, and I hear the trickle of dust and stone as bits of it crumble around my bloodied face. As I try to right myself, it begins to dawn on me that this has nothing to do with them wanting information. That they wouldn't have spared both of us if that were the case. <em>He</em> can't tell them anything.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">Perhaps it is a kind of mourning: the vigil we give to the living not yet dead. I think dark thoughts of funerals and lamentations, of what they will say over our empty graves at Igros. This is a useless vanity, however, and I remind myself that we are now alive, regardless of what is apportioned us.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Endure]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 35s t8n>>[[Intervene]]<</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">It gets worse--of course it gets worse. Ordallia has had more time than I have been alive to stew in resentment over the war we started. I suppose I can hardly expect a measured reaction from men with so much rage to vent. I remain as silent as I can for the rest, hoping they have somebody on hand to put me back together again when all this nonsense is done. I lose track of what is being said as their voices blur together.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I do nothing. They keep beating him, keep asking questions that I don't understand and that he doesn't answer. I am here watching, paralyzed by the futility of any action I might take. He does not look to me again, and I watch him fall. "<span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">Tell us where they are! Tell us where they are and your father might still have a pretty corpse to bury!</span>"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Collapsed in pain and choking back blood and bile, I tell myself that they cannot possibly want to kill me in this way and at this instant. I try and fail to keep fear from mastering me. By the time I hear my brother's voice, shouting some desperate plea in a language nobody here understands, my vision has already gone to black and I feel myself drift in and out of the present moment and all the hateful despair it carries.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I call his name, but he doesn't seem to hear me. One of them notices how far gone he is and tries to hold one of his fellows back. "<span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">Stop! You're killing him! We have nothing to barter with if he's dead!</span>" "<span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">We still have one left, don't we?</span>"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Dream|Dycedarg Dream 1]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> </table> <em>I remember how green it must have been, the mist of the sky clinging around me as it seemed to darken and deepen the colors of the unbloomed garden. My mother, somber and swollen, sat on one of the long stone benches cast over with bronze-blue lichen, twirling a plant with a long stalk and jagged leaves between her fingers.</em> <em>"They call this one feverfew."</em> <em>"For fevers then?"</em> <em>She nodded. "It also staunches the blood. If it is as before..." She paused, before continuing quietly. "They can mix it with chamomile and wine so I can still be delivered."</em> <em>I fidgeted with something in my hands, a top or a hoopstick or perhaps a leaf of my own--something I probably tore to pieces without thinking on it. I recall her always as sad and always as big with child, for all I know she must have been happy once and for all I know babes aren't begotten every day of the year.</em> <em>"I think it will be different," I said, trying to sound hopeful. "I think he will stay."</em> <em>She walked over, haltingly, and knelt to touch my hair.</em> <em>"I don't think on such things. Nature is not always as kind as it was with you."</em> <em>"Nature gives us all this, doesn't it," I said, gesturing to the garden. I remember feeling a touch annoyed that I was sitting there being tutored in simples when I could be elsewhere, doing something other than what I saw as work for girls.</em> <em>"Yes, but it also gives us poisons." She trembled a little as she held me. "Nature also takes."</em> <<set $dycedarg = "beaten">> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Wake|Wake 1]]<</timed>></span></div><em>It was summer, but all the color had been drained from the sky, as though the sun had burnt out the blue. I remember lying in the vastness of a child's room, trying as best as I could to remain still and unmoving. I had told myself that if I stayed where I was and didn't move, didn't blink, didn't do anything but look towards the lines of the wooden roof, the fever would not progress.</em> <em>I failed in my meaningless ordeal when the distant cathedral bells tolled for nones, and I looked toward the window to see the bone-colored hills that spread down towards the distant sea. The footsteps in the hall interwove with the throb of my heart and the swimming of my head. As I heard the sable-robed penitents marching beneath me, they seemed in accord with that rhythm.</em> <em>"Faram. Faram. Faram. Repent that we sinful and wayward might be spared."</em> <em>I had been told that there was sickness throughout the countryside--but that it had not yet come to the castle. I had been told that it was different than the sickness that lived in me.</em> <em>I stood up and went to the narrow window, unsteady. I undid the hasp and shuddered as the hot air hit my skin, but I stayed to watch the procession, winding through the streets like a black serpent that scattered the crowds through which it passed. I had long been an obedient and unrebellious boy, and I knew the wrongness of doing as I did, but I slipped onto the open window frame and sat on the sill. I remained there for some time, thinking of the motions of birds and stars that were etched invisibly in the sky above me.</em> <em>When I awoke, it was in the tumult of my father discovering me there, hanging over the vast drop between the tower and the earth. He clutched me to him, trembling in anger or in fear. I, still caught in the stupor of my dreams, bawled as I promised over and over again that I would not fall.</em> <<set $zalbag = "beaten">> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Wake|Wake 2]]<</timed>></span></div><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I return to consciousness as the cold magic of a priest (or whatever these damn heathens have) burns through me, reknitting muscle and bone as it lends fire to the sluggish humours of my body. I am unsure as to the time or as to how long I've been unconscious, but I have a sense that the sky outside is dark.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">They've taken their damned time. I watch the cleric stand over him from where I lie, eyes barely open in the unsteady candlelight. I lay unmoving on the ground like a corpse, wondering again and again if he's gone, if it's been too long to help him. <span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">Spirits of life, give a new life to the soul! Arise!</span></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">The light from the single candle that illumes this place wavers as the boy tending to me stands up. He has a decidedly scornful expression as I look up at him, and I spit the blood from my mouth. Magic sadly cannot recover what's already been spilt. </div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I see him lurch back to waking life, his eyes flickering open. Aside from the guard waiting for us at the door, the boy is the only one here. I don't know what they are planning, but I've decided this is our best chance.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I begin to say something to him. I find myself almost as completely taken by surprise as he is when the shadows cast by his light reach up and grapple him, twisting around his neck and throwing him to the floor. As my eyes focus, I see my brother awkwardly pinning him to the stone floor, having wrapped his bound hands around his neck. I act reflexively and push my own hands against his mouth, desperate that he shouldn't shout out and draw attention to whatever the hell it is we're doing.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I move as quietly as I can and catch him quick by the neck, trying to maneuver my bound hands to stifle his shouts. We both end up on the floor, and I pin him under my knee. My brother looks at me a moment, dazed, and then he leaps up and tries to muffle him. He seems fairly well subdued, for all the three of us are now arrayed in an almost comedically awkward tableau.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[["What the hell are we doing?"]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I'm propped up by the door when the healer walks in. After beating my brother into unconsciousness or worse, they had me down one of those abominable fast-acting potions to mend my own hurts and left me alone with him. I do not think they wanted to risk leaving both of us incapacitated. It is dark now. I have spent a very long day looking at him lie there, scanning his body for any sign of motion as I've tried to listen for errant chatter outside. These men are careless, and I've done and learned enough over the past hellish ten hours to make me almost hopeful.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">When I realize that I am alive, I do not move. I do not open my eyes; I try to make my breath as still as nothing; if I could hold in the pulse of my heart, I would. Every point on me seems to bear an injury, and the million stirrings of a living body bring all of them to my attention. I take one sharp breath as I hear the sound of footsteps and immediately regret it.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">The boy they've sent in can't have seen more than eighteen summers, and he kicks at my brother's purpled and bloodstained body, evidently not knowing he's being watched. He sets down a single candle and makes the necessary incantations with a terse, almost irritated tone, and I observe the dim foxfire glow of the healing magic as it seeps into my brother. He sputters awake, and the movement of his breath, which for so long I had convinced myself was an illusion, becomes ragged and wild.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">Somebody or something hovers over me, and I try not to react. I am kicked, and everything on that side shoots into a jagged pain. I try to mute the groan that escapes my lips as I hear an unfamiliar chant above me and tense to feel the familiar burn of a healer's arts, twisting through the fibers of my body like a vine. I gasp and choke as it reworks everything within me that has been broken. I hope that they haven't waited too long, lest something come together wrong.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I stand up in the wake of his moaning and stalk over to where the cleric hovers over him. I catch the boy around the throat, planting a sharp splinter of wood into his neck. It has taken me the better part of the day working on a loose fragment of the rough-hewn door to get here, and I exult to see the payoff. I look down to where my brother lies supine. I tell him we need to leave.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">As I open my eyes, I see the face of a fair-haired youth, mouth open in shock and eyes wide as a trickle of dark blood falls from his lips. He goes limp, and I see my brother as he pushes the body to the floor. He stands over me, looking determined but relieved. Reaching a hand down to help me up, he tells me we need to leave.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[["What happened?"]]<</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"What in the name of the Saint is going on?" I hiss in as low a whisper as I can manage.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"There's one man at least outside. I think they'll be expecting him back soon. We should run while we can."</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"We don't even know where we are! Where will we run <em>to</em>?"</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I look down to the wide-eyed youth pinned beneath me. He hasn't made any attempt to free himself or call out. I suspect he knows it won't go well for him. "Ask him." I tighten the haphazard grip I have on his throat.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I don't take my hands off the boy's mouth. I want to make my position as clear as possible.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"Listen well," I say as slowly and clearly as I can. "I know you might think it very noble and brave to remain silent when I ask you what the plan is for us and where in your godforsaken country we are. It might seem a touch hypocritical even, for me to ask so much of you when your very presence here is a testament to how tight-lipped I've been."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"I want to emphasize, however, that when I remain silent in such straits, it's because <em>I</em> know my relative worth in the game being played. I know <em>I'm</em> more valuable to you lot alive. What I want you to know right here and right now is that you are in no such position to negotiate. If you end up dead, we're not in any worse a place than when we started."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I look around a little nervously. This seems like a much longer question than the ones we needed answered.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"So when I let you speak, you're going to have a very short amount of time to convince me not to tell him to do his best to break your head clean off your body."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">He looks at me rather pointedly. I nod in agreement and then remember the man he's speaking to cannot see me.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I take a deep breath, and I remove my hands. He doesn't cry out.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">He removes his hands, and I tense. I have no idea if everything is about to go wrong.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[["Where are we?"]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"What happened? You made a desperate charge for a soldier and were thrashed into a pulp. I spent half the day wondering if you were dead."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"Well, I'm not."</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I smile. "This is a rather shoddy operation all around, you know. Hands tied round front. Beating prisoners unconscious. Sending one man in to patch you up. I should have had more faith they wouldn't be competent enough to kill you."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I nod, pulling myself up off the floor. He does this a lot: reassures himself by explaining how he never needed reassurances. I flex my hands, checking to see if anything's misaligned. </div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"They're also very bad at keeping quiet. We're somewhere directly to the east of Zelmonia, apparently. Ten leagues out. We were going to set out west tomorrow--likely to meet up with whomever orchestrated this."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"Right." Everything seems to have healed correctly. I stretch, trying to shake off the strange malaise that lying nearly dead all day leaves a man with. "So what do we do?</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"We get out of here and try to make it west before them--get back to our side if possible." I scan the room, listening for the footfalls of the guard outside, my gaze lands on the collapsed body of the priest on the floor. "Watch the door."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I kick the body a little disdainfully before I search it, well aware of the pettiness of my actions. I assure myself that I know what I'm doing, and I think of home, where the larkspur must be in bloom and the peasants rushing to keep their cattle from it.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I look to the door, uncertain as to what I will do if somebody opens it. I trace the outline of the religious icon I wear under my tunic, remembering the deep bruise it had cut into my chest only moments ago.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Search the body]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"We're ten leagues east of the Zelmonian border."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">"We're ten leagues east of the Zelmonian border."</span></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">He's obviously scared. They shouldn't have left someone so green alone with two high profile prisoners.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">He's talking. He's talking and nobody's checked in on us yet. If we have just a little bit longer...</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"Why were we taken?"</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">"Why were we taken?"</span></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"I don't know, but they're going to march you west tomorrow. Somewhere into the hills that eventually turn into Germinas."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">"I don't know, but they're going to march you west tomorrow. Somewhere into the hills that eventually turn into Germinas."</span></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I can work with this. We'll have to run west anyway, and I can figure things out once we're moving in that direction.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I hear the pacing of footsteps outside. I still my breath as though muting the air in my lungs might help conceal us a few moments longer.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I smile reassuringly at him and then turn to my brother. "Kill him."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">My brother looks at me, and I'm uncertain as to how things have panned out. He tells me to kill him.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Kill Him]]<</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 20s t8n>>[[Spare Him]]<</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I peel off the man's long clerical robes and rummage as quickly through his possessions as I can.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I keep my vigil, wishing I had a weapon as I fidget aimlessly without one.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I soon discover myself to be the proud owner of three pieces of very sad looking jerky; a pouch with some herbs that will be useless unless I am weathering a fever or making a stew; and a small herbalist's knife. I feel as though I'm in some sort of insipid mummer's show as I rapidly don the dead man's robes. I slide the handle of the knife into one of my brother's hands and two of the rations into the other. I try to choke down a single piece of the stuff myself. Neither of us have eaten for two days.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I exhale deeply when providence grants me my wish, and my brother hands me a small dagger of some sort in addition to some dried meat. I stuff it into my mouth and chew it as best I can, the taste of blood still on my tongue. I look back and see he's wearing the dead man's garments, and the plan he's been envisioning seems plain enough. I am about to check in with him when I see the slit of night sky overhanging the door in front of me widen. I brace myself to make do with what I've been given.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Suddenly, the door opens, and I stand by as the man who enters is caught, dragged forward, and unceremoniously slaughtered in front of me. He tries to cry out as he falls, but there is no sound. I watch as a red gash bloom across his throat, and without hesitating, I quickly rush to the door to shut it.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">When the soldier walks in, I don't give him time to mark what he sees. I pull him forward and cut his throat. It is simple, clean, almost mechanical. As my brother closes the door, I kneel down, unhasping the buckles on the distinctive Ordallian mail.</div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Escape]]<</timed>></span></div> <table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">He makes short work of him, and I'm spared having to endure some sort moralizing lecture in the midst of...<em>this</em>. Not that I'd really expect it from him under the circumstances; he's surprisingly good at being pragmatic when the chips are down. I reckon that most soldiers who live this long are.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I jerk back my arms, and his neck breaks cleanly. There's some relief in that he doesn't seem aware that it was coming--he moves from quick to dead without fear or apprehension. I suppress my own anxieties about the affair and move on. I will no doubt chart out the balance between sin and necessity later.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I gesture for him to untie my hands and we manage as fast as we're able to get both of ourselves loose. I try to shake off the numbness while he looks at the door. I trust he'll deal with somebody barging in better than I will, so I stop to search the corpse, peeling off the man's long clerical robes and rummaging as quickly through his possessions as I can.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">We manage to free one another, and I turn my attention to the door. Whatever pacing I heard before has stilled, and I don't have a good way of estimating how many people are out there now. I wish I had a weapon. I can't wring the necks of the entire Ordallian army.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I soon discover myself to be the proud owner of three pieces of very sad looking jerky; a pouch with some herbs that will be useless unless I am weathering a fever or making a stew; and a small herbalist's knife. I feel as though I'm in some sort of insipid mummer's show as I rapidly don the dead man's robes, slide the handle of the knife into my brother's hand, and try to choke down a single piece of jerky. I don't know if and what they've fed him, but I haven't eaten for two days.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I exhale deeply when providence grants me my wish, and my brother hands me a small dagger of some sort. I shudder a little as I look back and see he's wearing the dead man's garments, but the plan he's envisioning seems plain enough. I am about to check in with him when I see the slit of night sky overhanging the door in front of me widen. I brace myself to make do with what I've been given.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Suddenly, the door opens, and I stand by as the man who enters is caught, dragged forward, and unceremoniously slaughtered in front of me. He tries to cry out as he falls, but there is no sound. I watch as a red gash bloom across his throat, and without hesitating, I quickly rush to the door to shut it.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">When the soldier walks in, I don't give him time to mark what he sees. I pull him forward and cut his throat. It is simple, clean, almost mechanical. Unlike the boy, there's a restfulness to this--an inevitability. As my brother closes the door, I kneel down, unhasping the buckles on the distinctive Ordallian mail.</div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Escape]]<</timed>></span></div> <table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">He hesitates, looks at me for a moment before looking down at the healer, then he starts to choke him with a measured, slow pressure that leaves him kicking and gasping. For all his piety, I sometimes forget my brother's foremost business is killing. I do not relish watching the boy writhe, and if I had the ability to end things more quickly, I would. He stops when the body goes slack and gestures for me to come over.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I look to my brother and recognize that he clearly wouldn't ask this of me if he didn't think it necessary. For one reason or another, I weigh the necessity differently. I press as best I can into the sides of the boy's neck, hitting the large arteries there. There's a fearfulness to things as he struggles against the faint, and I recognize that he will not thank me if he survives this. I let go the moment he loses consciousness and wave my brother over.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">It takes a few moments, but we're soon able to get both of ourselves loose. I try to shake the numbness from my limbs while he looks at the door. I trust he'll deal with somebody barging in better than I will, so I stop to search the corpse, peeling off the man's long clerical robes and rummaging as quickly through his possessions as I can.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">We manage to free one another, and I turn my attention to the door. Whatever pacing I heard before has stilled, and I don't have a good way of estimating how many people are out there now. I wish I had a weapon. I'm unlikely to find more opportunities for mercy on a night like this.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">It soon becomes very evident to me that the boy is alive, albeit unconscious. Stifling my annoyance, I resolve not to mention it, but I make a much more rapid search than I would have otherwise. I uncover only a small herbalist's knife that I hand to my brother. Only once its in his hands do I have the passing thought that I might have employed it to still the lad's breath myself. I pull the robes over my head and try to look pious.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I exhale deeply when providence grants me my wish, and my brother hands me a small dagger of some sort. I look back and see he's wearing the boy's garments. The plan he's envisioning seems plain enough. I am about to check in with him when I see the slit of night sky overhanging the door in front of me widen. I brace myself to make do with what I've been given.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Suddenly, the door opens, and I stand by as the man who enters is caught, dragged forward, and unceremoniously slaughtered in front of me. He tries to cry out as he falls, but there is no sound. I watch as a red gash bloom across his throat, and without hesitating, I quickly rush to the door to shut it.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">When the soldier walks in, I don't give him time to mark what he sees. I pull him forward and cut his throat. It is simple, clean, almost mechanical. This time, I can find no occasion to balk or pause. As my brother closes the door, I kneel down, unhasping the buckles on the distinctive Ordallian mail.</div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Escape]]<</timed>></span></div> We move out into the night and through the ruins, trying to walk slowly and with a quiet, unassuming attitude. Nobody stops us, and we both fear that all this is a trap--that we will be discovered and dragged away to whatever fate they have marked for us. It becomes clear as we wind our way through the camp, however, that these men have neither the resources nor the morale to run a particularly tight operation. It occurs to us that whomever took us and whomever we are to be taken to do not walk amongst the ragged souls picking on hardtack and nettles. The moon is full now, and once we reach the edge of the encampment, we walk some distance into the woods, checking once again the position of the polestar before we bolt. We do not know where it is to which we are running or how long will be the journey, but we have our course now, and we are free. <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Keep Running]]<</timed>></span></div> <table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">The ruins of the ancients are scattered everywhere, and I imagine that in happier circumstances I might have admired them. The forest unnerves me, the blue-tinted foliage of so many trees I've never seen hanging over my head. We've slowed to a lumbering but steady pace by the time the sun is well in the sky, and whatever prayers we've made seem to find favor, for we still see no sight of our pursuers.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">We keep on all night, watching the moon set between the gaps in the trees as the sky begins to purple. Dreams seem to intrude upon me as I walk through the night--as though I am asleep as I walk. I try to think on the Saint, and I imagine that the cracks in the leaf cover and the stars that speckle them form an image of His face.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">It is only when we catch sight of the cliffs ahead of us that we hear the rustling leaves and the shout of riders behind us. He yells that we need to run and, grabbing my arm, drags me with him as he sprints forward, weaving a path through the brush and jutting roots that cover the forest floor.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I am brought back to the waking world by the sound of something on the move, and I jolt into action when I hear the sound of human voices. They have found us. I grab my brother by the arm and tell him we need to run, as fast and as far as we can. My side begins to stitch, and I sprint through it, tumbling forward through space until I run out of it.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">We emerge into the sunlight and find that the ground stops abruptly, terminating in a deep ravine cut through by a river. Fortune favors us for once on this godforsaken mission and I spy a bridge a little ways down. If we just press on, we can keep running.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">We're out of the woods at long last, having emerged to find ourself caught between a precipice and our pursuers. My brother jerks my hand to the north, and I see a bridge spanning the chasm. We have at least one path out, narrow though it may be.</div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Cross the River]]<</timed>></span></div> <table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">We run to the north, and I imagine that we're already on the other side. I am there, free and alive and racing towards the thousand miles between us and home. I am <em>not</em> going to die in this meaningless wilderness. I am not going to be a pawn in anyone's plans.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I keep running, and I try not to think about anything but the motion of my body in space. I do not know what will happen to us. I do not know if I am going to die. I can only focus on this instant of time in which I move, trusting that I will be conveyed to the place appointed to me.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">We are nearly there when they emerge from the forest, shouting for us to stop if we want to live. I ignore them and keep on, until I hear the sound of my first footfall hitting the wood of the bridge...</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I can hear the sounds of men shouting, but I m still running. I am still running and still alive, and the aching cramp in my side is just an idea around which I'm moving. I feel myself fly towards the bridge and I am suddenly right behind my brother, about to cross...</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">...and then I hear the creak of a bow being drawn.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">...and then I hear the creak of a bow being drawn.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I turn around and see a band of Ordallian soldiers who give every appearance of being in much better shape than our prior hosts. The one nearest us has my brother in his sights.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I turn around to see an Ordallian unit, their armor glinting once more in the sun . A man at their forefront aims his bow in my direction.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"We would rather you both live, but we only need one of you. Don't think I won't fire."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span style="font-family:'Ivalician';">We would rather you both live, but we only need one of you. Don't think I won't fire.</span>"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I have every reason to believe them.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I freeze. If I had it in me to laugh, I would.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 33s t8n>>[[Intercede]]<</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Die]]<</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I watch as he stands there, calm and collected as if this were nothing more pressing than a guildsman's play. I do not say anything. I do not move. He looks back at me, as if asking me what to do.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I cannot understand what has been said, but I know that we will either surrender or die, and I have tried throughout this to make my peace with those possibilities. I look back to my brother, and he seems pale. I hope this qualifies as a farewell.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><em>And suddenly...</em> suddenly I push in front of him, and he falls behind me as the arrow pierces my breast. I shout, stumbling back as the two of us tumble into the expanse below.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><em>...the arrow hits home</em>, and I fall backwards, still alive and whole. He is here, crushing back against me, and as I realize what he's done, I have only a moment to react, grasping him close as we fall.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I sink into the dark, fighting it every step of the way. As the light and verdure all around me falls from my vision, I curse myself. I have never before been tempted towards martyrdom and heroics. I have never before been the sort to sacrifice myself for sentiment.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">We are rushing down now, and I know it is also summer in far off Gallione. I clasp him tight, and try to orient us feet first as we head into the greenblue dark of the river. The air feels very warm as I close my eyes.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">It doesn't matter. As I start to fade, I recognize protesting my motives and meanings to be useless. I have done what I have done, and he had <em>best</em> live to justify it.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I do not pray. I know that he has never put much stock in prayer.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>><<if $dycedarg is "beaten">>[[Dream|Dycedarg Dream 2.1]]<</if>><<if $zalbag is "beaten">>[[Dream|Dycedarg Dream 2.2]]<</if>><</timed>></span></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> </table><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I watch as he stands there, calm and collected as if this were nothing more pressing than a guildsman's play. I do not say anything. I do not move. He looks back at me, as if asking me what to do.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I cannot understand what has been said, but I know that we will either surrender or die, and I have tried throughout this to make my peace with those possibilities. I look back to my brother, and he seems pale. I hope this qualifies as a farewell.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"><em>And suddenly...</em></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><em>...the arrow hits home.</em></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I catch him as he falls and see the crush of men approaching me. I had expected them to give me more time--more time to think, more time to <em>find a way out</em>. I gaze downward, and tell myself that the river is deeper than it looks.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I fall backwards and feel the thunderous beat of my heart trying to pour everything out of me. I look to the sky and let the sun burn a spot in my vision, thinking on the Paradise I ought drift to.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I jump, dragging him down with me. I cannot think this foolish in the moment. I have decided already that we are going to live.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">That dark spot soon grows into a dark everything, and I feel myself fall and float. Dissolving to the space around me, I imagine I am not alone.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>><<if $dycedarg is "beaten">>[[Dream|Zalbag Dream 2.2]]<</if>><<if $zalbag is "beaten">>[[Dream|Zalbag Dream 2.1]]<</if>><</timed>></span></div></td> </tr> </table><em>It was July, and I resented having to wear black, envying the peasantry for the lack of ritual with which they died. It was simple enough, I thought, to leave the dead to the ground and keep on with things. The poor didn't have to hang sables, or hold mourner's feasts, or distribute alms, or pay for masses, or tell the damned bees people had died. They simply persisted, like every other thing in the world.</em> <em>I was resentful of many things. The surreality of the double sacrament no doubt helped in that regard--the chaos of folding all the spectacle of a funeral and a baptism into one carnivalesque week of wonders. The seneschal took most of the particulars in hand, conveying my father's sympathies to me when he was able to send letters from Bervenia. I was told very frequently that I was to be brave and that I was to be kind to my brother.</em> <em>I needed neither of these instructions. I was not afraid of my mother's death, and my hatred for the child who had finally killed her ended when I saw what a pathetic thing a seven-month babe was. I did not believe that the shriveled, squalling creature they presented at the font would live out the week, and as such, I saw no reason to treat it cruelly.</em> <em>It was in the flurry of preparation for some ceremony or another--something to do with the old Duke perhaps--that the two of us were left alone for the first time. One of the exhausted nurses recruited from the countryside pleaded with me to watch him for but a few moments, and I was left in the nursery before I could respond. It was so strange to look at him: the only thing in the whole of the shrouded and somber manse that wore white.</em> <em>He cried when he saw me, of course, and I did nothing to try and abate that. Instead I sat down, back against the wall, and wept myself, letting his howling drown out my own.</em> <<set $dycedarg ="doublehurt">> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Wake|Wake 3]]<</timed>></span></div> <em>I believe that I first lost faith in my father's nobility when the priests replaced the doctors that summer. I do not accuse him of wanting death to visit Igros any sooner, but I remember thinking time and time again that he saw it would go easy on us if all our mourning was done before we were recalled back east.</em> <em>My brother was already very enchanted by divinity, and I think he found the ceremonies of the final rites particularly to his liking. He was paid every attention and told he would finally be rewarded for the one thing he seemed to be good at. Heaven had a special place for those whose talents consisted of being ill.</em> <em>I stopped by his room one night, candle in hand, and spoke to him. I do not remember my every motive, but I recall that I felt very fed up with the whole affair. He greeted me very politely and asked if I was coming to say goodbye.</em> <em>"You know..." I started quietly. "You don't have to die."</em> <em>"All things have to die," he replied. "Besides, I've been shriven and made ready for it."</em> <em>"You don't enter into a contract with death when they smear some oil on you and have you drink from a cup."</em> <em>"They say I will die."</em> <em>"And yet..." I gestured to him. "You haven't died."</em> <em>He sat there quiet for a moment, as if this were some great revelation. "I've been sick a long time," he offered as a counterpoint.</em> <em>"Well, I think now's a good time to stop, then." I sat on the edge of the bed. "Everything else in nature lives if it can. Lizards and salamanders keep on even when you cut them to bits. A sprig of purslane grows new roots if you put it in a glass. There are toads they've dug up that have lived airless in stones since before the war."</em> <em>He looked somewhat skeptical.</em> <em>"It's rotten that they do this to us," I said with a blunt, angry honesty that I don't think he understood. "You aren't dead, and while you can't live by wishing, I hope you do it anyway just to spite them. I hope you don't die until you've outlived the whole lot of useless old men in this castle--until you've slaughtered all the Ordallians so I don't have to anymore."</em> <em>He did not seem terribly convinced, but when I got up--exasperated--and prepared to leave, he grabbed my shirt sleeve and asked me to stay.</em> <em>When I awoke, curled next to him, it was to the panic of one of the last physicians in attendance, who feared lest both heirs to the household should perish of the same contagion. I was hurried out by a number of attending domestics who spread morbid rumors all through the morning that I had been found next to his corpse.</em> <em>His fever broke four days later.</em> <<set $dycedarg ="bestend">> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Wake|Wake 3]]<</timed>></span></div> <em>The garden was just beginning to bloom that spring, and our sister was doing her utmost to murder every flower she could find. I sat on a stone bench recently cleaned of moss and tried to tell her that her heap of sacrifices would cause a great deal of trouble for someone or another. It was hopeless to argue with her. She was a lovely, unreasoning, selfish child of three, and it would have been cruel to chastise a girl about to be spirited away from home and family.</em> <em>We had no inkling, at the time, why our father had determined that she was to be instated as an oblate, but we were to escort her to a monastery he had selected in the course of our journey east. After that we were to head to Zeltennia. It was to be the first time I might see combat, and I did my best to show neither fear nor excitement about this prospect. I told myself that my portion of days were already measured.</em> <em>When my brother finally arrived to meet us (the elder one, for I now had two), he saw the scene before him and stopped cold. For the briefest of moments, a look of intense emotion passed over his features. I thought he might weep--although I have never seen him do so before.</em> <em>"We should to be on the road before the terce bells," he said calmly, composing himself in an instant. "She will like as not sleep until we're within a few leagues of Gariland that way."</em> <em>"Should we take her to say her goodbyes? Father will want to see her at least."</em> <em>He stooped to examine one of the flower heads she'd been mutilating, and smiled as she thrust something like a cluster of miniature daisies into his hands with a peal of laughter. He scooped her up with one arm--much to her amusement--and walked towards the keep, carrying her over his shoulder as one might a barrel or sack of flour.</em> <em>I did not follow at first, but he called to me and told me that I had goodbyes to say too--that it was like as not that the four children born to this house would not share the same roof for a very long time.</em> <<set $zalbag = "worstend">> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Wake|Wake 4]]<</timed>></span></div><em>We rode back to Igros and saw that every parapet and tower ran our family's green banner alongside the white lion of Gallione. Returning back to the world of civilian life, I realized how little I recognized it--how I felt at all hours a ghost in the rush of everyday men. After three years, the bustle of markets and the calls of peddlers had become strange each time I returned to them.</em> <em>When we set foot within the keep itself, I watched as everyone we passed looked at me in what seemed a terrorful awe and then turned away from my gaze. It was as though I were the cockatrice come down from a flag. When we reached the great hall, the new-made Duke knelt. As every man and woman in the court did likewise, I wished that I could follow suite. I was not yet twenty, and I had been made to stand here alone in spectacle.</em> <em>I spoke later to my brother, and I saw he was in ready accord with me when I claimed our real savior was the plague--that the Romandans had withdrawn because they were in need of able-bodied men to bury the dead back home. He did not say as much, but he laughed to hear my frustrations at being a hero. Later that night, I walked the circuit of the castle walls, looking at where the obscured moon shone as a dim light in the the overcast sky. I thought to talk to him again, to ask him plain what his true thoughts were of all this.</em> <em>I did not seek him out. Instead, I went to the room where each of us had stayed as children, and I left on the bed the silver circlet the king had sent me in display of favor. Much to his majesty's and my father's chagrin, I had not accepted the invitation to join some distant royal cousin to our bloodline. I decided that night I had no more need of baubles than I had of a wife.</em> <em>I told my father the next morning that I wished to ride for the eastern front. Within two weeks, I found myself quartered at Limberry near to the Ordallian border.</em> <<set $zalbag ="doublehurt">> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Wake|Wake 4]]<</timed>></span></div><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I come to, warm, mud-crusted and feeling as though some shard of hot glass lies next to my heart and is trying its damnedest to worm its way over to it. I perceive the lumbering pace of a body in motion underneath mine, and I realize that I'm slung over somebody's shoulder, being jostled about as though I'm a sack of flour.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">The river is out of sight, and I've been carrying my brother for the better part of the morning--with no idea where I'm heading save to the west. As I cut through grasslands and plains, I'm painfully aware of how easily I'll be sighted if they catch up to us. I eventually place him on the ground a bit, dizzy from the midday sun and wondering anew if he'll ever awaken.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I feel whoever's carrying me lower my body into the sharp prickles of meadowgrass. My eyes blink open, and I squint up to see my brother, bedraggled and sunburnt. He's grinning like its a high holiday and he's been given both the obligation and absolution necessary to enjoy himself.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I watch his eyes open, and he smiles with an uncharacteristic warmth that I imagine must mirror my own. I've felt this whole time that I must have messed something up--that I should have snapped the arrowshaft down farther or gotten him out of the water quicker. It seemed a certainty I'd make some error and he'd die.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">My chest burns as I feel myself grin back.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"Can you move?" I ask, still aware that we're not anywhere near safety.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"I'm going to have to, aren't I?" I sputter, and everything begins to burn sharper and hotter from the effort of talking. "Where are we?"</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"As little ways downstream as I could manage and as far west as I could carry you."</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"Are they still following us?"</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"I don't know. I imagine they must be."</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"Hold me up then."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Keep Moving]]<</timed>></span></div><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I'm a congealing mess of mud, blood, and sweat, and I feel like an ungainly idiot carting my brother around while having to stop now and push the mat of riverslick hair from my eyes. I wish he'd have the good grace to wake up and walk himself back to Zelmonia, as I'm certain I'm about to reopen his wound and make a waste of all the time I've invested in keeping him from bleeding out.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">The gold of a summer sun turns the blackness of my vision red, filtering through my eyelids as I feel my body lurch forward. The hole in my chest aches, and I'm aware that there's some sort of thick, cottony nothing where the arrowhead should be. I still pains me terribly, but I've weathered worse.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I look back, and I can still see the distant outline of the cliffs behind us. He does--in fact--begin to slip from my grip again, and I do my best to hold onto him just enough that the fall isn't a bad one. I hear a sharp yelp, and when I look down at him, he's awake--staring at me in apparent confusion. I laugh.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I slowly slip to the ground with an unsteady jolt, and I shout, my eyes opening to see my brother standing over me. He laughs when he sees I've awakened. I laugh when I see what a miserable figure he cuts--he looks like a sheepdog whose shepherd has just injudiciously attempted to drown him.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"You certainly took your time." I smile. "Please tell me you'll find the strength to walk."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"I'll do what I can," I say, uncertain as to how steady I'm going to be when I attempt to stand up. "Where are we."</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"Not terribly far from where we last were."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"And they haven't caught up with us?"</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">"I'm hoping they've given us up for dead."</div></td> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext"></div></td> <td><div class="innertext">"I doubt it. Here, help me up."</div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Keep Moving]]<</timed>></span></div>We stumble forward, leaning on each other as we look for any signs of ally or enemy. We wonder if it wouldn't have been better for us to remain captives--and assure ourselves, as we stumble through the wilderness--that it was right of us to run. Even if we aren't always united in our sense of ideals and reasoning, neither of us wants to give any aid to the enemy. Neither of us is going to fall into place for Viura's plans. By the mid-afternoon, we can make out the curvature of distant hills, and we swear that there is the shape of rising smoke in the air. We are nearing some end--whatever it might be. <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Approach]]<</timed>></span></div>Of course we have apprehensions. Of course we are cautious, It does not take great minds to determine that the site to which we are moving might well be an enemy camp or some peasant's lodge as easily as it might have anything to do with our father's men. We haven't much of a choice now, however. One of us is half-dead from injury and both of us are fatigued and starving. If we don't press on, we'll like as not die in this vast nowhere, and there will be no utility to anyone in that. It will later seem very dramatic, no doubt, that we should hear the riders on the move just as the parley site comes into view. There, down the steep face of another jutting hill, we see the bright colors of the Northern Sky and the shimmer of Ordallian mail standing stark against the white outlines of another ruin. We turn and see the enemy fast approaching in the distance behind us and look on to see some fragment of our army below us. There can be no question as to our course. We run, the stronger of us dragging the weaker one by the arm, trying to ignore every failing of our battered and weary bodies. If we can keep running, if we can make this one last leap through the brush and bramble, we will have reached the end. We will be somewhere we can rest. <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Fly Through|Keep Running 2]]<</timed>></span></div>Some force--be it our own determination or the will of the Saint--presses us forward, and we realize as we draw nearer, that we can make out the clear, sonorous sound of a familiar voice. "<em>What do you have to offer that would drive me to such a concession?</em>" We can just glimpse the shape and form of our father, who stands before the small contingent of our men. We fly down the edge of the hill moments before the riders catch the edge of it. The enemy general speaks. "<em>How high a value do you place on the lives of your sons?</em>" Above us we hear their steeds rearing and shrieking. We do not stop. There is a long silence as the figures in the distance grow nearer. We assume some evidence of our capture is being displayed. "<em>I love my sons dearly.</em>" We move without a sliver of grace. If we bloody ourselves further by falling, it is still a push forward. "<em>If you have them and kill them it will be an unending wound to my heart...</em> We're nearing the end now. We can hear the scramble of men on foot above us. <em>...but I must love my country more.</em>" We know now what our fate is if we are caught. <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[Survive|Keep Running 3]]<</timed>></span></div>He speaks of how the Northern Sky cannot capitulate for reasons of personal sentiment. He speaks of how there are duties deeper than those wrought in blood. He speaks of how a man might have more sons but may never recover his honor once lost. We make it to the foot of that hill and hear a shout go up. When he sees us, laughing like madmen as the soldiers behind us freeze and the soldiers before us press close, his face becomes as pallid as the pagan edifice that surrounds him. Needless to say, no agreement is reached at that parley. <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>><<if $dycedarg is "bestend">>[[Defy the Laws of Nature and Come Out Alive|"Good" Ending]]<</if>><<if $dycedarg is "doublehurt">>[[Defy the Laws of Nature and Come Out Alive|Ending 1]]<</if>><<if $zalbag is "doublehurt">>[[Defy the Laws of Nature and Come Out Alive|Ending 2]]<</if>><<if $zalbag is "worstend">>[[Defy the Laws of Nature and Come Out Alive|"Bad" Ending]]<</if>><</timed>></span></div><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Looking back, the whole thing seems very romantic, given the future course of the war. It makes for an inspiring story to tell after the fact, but in the end, it isn't the Ordallians who pay our kingdom reparations.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">It wasn't, of course, a happy ending. Not really. It was a happy waypoint, I suppose. A bright moment in the transit of our house's star before it fell.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">My wound was infected and a fever set in. I very nearly died yet again in the tumult of the next two weeks. Our recovery was a boon to my father's conscience, but it brought little joy to a country anticipating a peace after forty-five years of conflict.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I was uncertain what to do with myself for a while. I have no head for politicking, and this seemed a mess for the politicians. I ate. I rested. I prayed with gratitude for our salvation and with desperation that my brother should still be spared. I suppose I had been right about my handling of his injury.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">When I came to, my brother was hovering over me again. We didn't speak then. I thought at the time that we understood one another.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">He lived, of course. I did not mention the arrow to him ever again. I thought he would not like to be reminded of it.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Later, when I was alone, I thought on my father's words--of what I had and hadn't done, and what he would and would not admit to. I became very resolved to never think it my duty to die.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">As for my father's decision, I confess it sometimes grieved me. I bore him no grudge, however. He was completely correct in his assessment of where one's obligations lay, and if I chafed at this, it was my own fears that bore the blame.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I resolved further that I would someday have power such that nobody else might be so mistaken.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I thought often in the days that followed of how I might better prepare myself to die with grace.</div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[End]]<</timed>></span></div><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Looking back, the whole thing seems very romantic, given the future course of the war. It makes for an inspiring story to tell after the fact, but in the end, it isn't the Ordallians who pay our kingdom reparations.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">It wasn't, of course, a happy ending. Not really. It was a happy waypoint, I suppose. A bright moment in the transit of our house's star before it fell.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I did my utmost to try to salvage something amidst the fallout of the debacle. Our survival--miracle that it was--did little to impress a world that had thought itself poised on the edge of peace. My brother mended fairly quickly. The makeshift poultice I'd applied seemed to keep together.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I collapsed rather understandably after reaching the ruin. When I awoke, I found myself alone. I was told a healer had been able to set me largely to rights, although I was a ravenous, aching wreck for the rest of the week. </div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I saw him right after they patched him up. He seemed in fairly high spirits. I was not at all surprised when he parted again from me in short order, finding another battlefield in which to throw himself.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I thanked my brother for all he had done when next I saw him. He seemed quite eager to put all this behind us, and I did not burden him further by loitering about him.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">When I was alone, I thought often of my father's words--of what I had and hadn't done, and what he would and would not admit to. I became very resolved to never think it my duty to die.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">My father's words were merely ill-timed, and I did not bear him any grudge for them. He was completely correct in his assessment of where one's obligations lay, and if I chafed at this, it was my own fears that bore the blame.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I resolved further that I would someday have power such that nobody else might be so mistaken.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I thought often in the days that followed of how I might better prepare myself to die with grace.</div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[End]]<</timed>></span></div>You have reached the end of "Let Your Curse Be On Me." Thank you for playing. Please consider replaying while making different choices throughout the story to reveal new narrative content. <table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Looking back, the whole thing seems very romantic, given the future course of the war. It makes for an inspiring story to tell after the fact, but in the end, it isn't the Ordallians who pay our kingdom reparations.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">It wasn't, of course, a happy ending. Not really. It was a happy waypoint, I suppose. A bright moment in the transit of our house's star before it fell.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I did my utmost to try to salvage something amidst the fallout of the debacle. Our survival--miracle that it was--did little to impress a world that had thought itself poised on the edge of peace. My brother mended fairly quickly. The makeshift poultice I'd applied seemed to keep together.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I collapsed rather understandably after reaching the ruin. When I awoke, I found myself alone. I was told a healer had been able to set me largely to rights, although I was a ravenous, aching wreck for the rest of the week. </div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I saw him right after they patched him up. I spoke to him little, however. I thought that it would be best if we did not long remain in each other's company.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I did not know what to say when next I saw my brother. I thanked him, but I recognize now that it was then I first felt the extent to which we had always been strangers, however much we might endure.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">When I was alone, I thought often of my father's words--of what I had and hadn't done, and what he would and would not admit to. I became very resolved to never think it my duty to die.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">My father's words were merely ill-timed, and I did not bear him any grudge for them. He was completely correct in his assessment of where one's obligations lay, and if I chafed at this, it was my own fears that bore the blame.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I resolved further that I would someday have power such that nobody else might be so mistaken.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I thought often in the days that followed of how I might better prepare myself to die with grace.</div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[End]]<</timed>></span></div><table> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Looking back, the whole thing seems very romantic, given the future course of the war. It makes for an inspiring story to tell after the fact, but in the end, it isn't the Ordallians who pay our kingdom reparations.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">It wasn't, of course, a happy ending. Not really. It was a happy waypoint, I suppose. A bright moment in the transit of our house's star before it fell.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">My wound was infected and a fever set in. I very nearly died yet again in the tumult of the next two weeks. Our recovery was a boon to my father's conscience, but it brought little joy to a country anticipating a peace after forty-five years of conflict.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I was uncertain what to do with myself for a while. I have no head for politicking, and this seemed a mess for the politicians. I ate. I rested. I prayed with gratitude for our salvation and with desperation that my brother should still be spared. I suppose I had been right about my handling of his injury.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">When I came to, my brother was hovering over me again. We spoke little at the time, and looking back I do not recall what was said. I remember thinking, however, that being a hero suited him much better than it suited me.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">He lived, of course. I have remembered very often the time we spent in each other's company, and the things one might say to a man in the throes of sickness that you cannot say otherwise.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">Later, when I was alone, I thought on my father's words--of what I had and hadn't done, and what he would and would not admit to. I became very resolved to never think it my duty to die.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">As for my father's decision, I confess it sometimes grieved me. I bore him no grudge, however. He was completely correct in his assessment of where one's obligations lay, and if I chafed at this, it was my own fears that bore the blame.</div></td> </tr> <tr> <td><div class="innertext">I resolved further that I would someday have power such that nobody else might be so mistaken.</div></td> <td><div class="innertext">I thought often in the days that followed of how I might better prepare myself to die with grace.</div></td> </tr> </table> <div style="width:100%; text-align:center;"><span class="slowfade"><<timed 0s t8n>>[[End]]<</timed>></span></div>

**Author's Note:**

> See my [profile](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CorpseBrigadier/profile) for notes on remixes, podfic, derivative works, and constructive criticism.


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